Looking at the S Face of Rook Mountain from Crow Pass. The South Couloir is the obvious line left of what appears to be the summit (the true summit lies right above the couloir). The dog is the infamous "Nook" who gloms onto every other skier. His tag reads "Nook. Your Crow Pass Guide. Please return when you're done." Photo by Eric Parsons.

A spectacular
peak from all directions, Rook Mountain lies North and 2000' above Raven
Glacier. There is no easy route to the summit which makes it a worthy objective
that you must plan for in terms of weather, conditions and route.
It's a mountain I've been staring at for 10+ years waiting for the right
combination of good snow conditions and solid partners and I've spent many a
day walking or skiing past, looking up and waiting.

The South Couloir in particular has been on my mind ever since
Ross Noffsinger invited me to climb the route in 2009. Unfortunately I
had plans that day (Yvonne, Eric and I climbed Flute the same day that Hart/Lindholm/Noffsinger climbed Rook) but I saved the email
and subsequent photos shared from the route in the hopes of one day getting a chance
at the route. Finally, conditions and weather lined up for an early spring
attempt with Eric Parsons and we set out for Crow Pass on perfect day in late
March 2017.

Concrete, ice & sastrugi above a 500' slide for life slope.

Nearing Crow Pass.

Getting up and
over Crow Pass in the dead of winter is not a particularly easy task. The
trail, which is an old road bed built into a hillside, gets packed in with snow
and you have to side-hill for several miles on a wind and ice packed 40 degree
slope above a 500' drop into the creek before finally gaining a bench.
Once you gain the bench the travel gets easier but the avalanche exposure gets worse and
you go from worrying about a slip to worrying about being buried.

Dropping down to the Raven glacier (photo by Eric Parsons).

Eric heading across the Raven glacier. Nook leads the way.

S Face of Rook Mountain. The true summit is actually the far right bump just above the South Couloir.

Eventually we
reached Crow Pass and then quickly skied across the pass and dropped down to
Raven Glacier where we donned the climbing harnesses and pulled out the rope
and crevasse gear. Across Raven Glacier - which had good coverage and
minimal crevasse danger - and then up onto the pocket glacier that lies at the
base of the South Face of Raven. (Note that older maps show the glacier
having continuous coverage from the Raven proper all the way up into the basin
at the base of the South face - however in recent years the glacier has melted
out to the point where it is no longer connected.)

Across the bergschrund, rope packed away and booting.

Halfway up the couloir (photo by Eric Parsons).

Once up onto the
pocket glacier we continued to the base of the couloir. We stayed roped
up for the bergschrund crossing, but once across we untied, packed away the
rope, threw the skis on the back and started booting up.

Nearing the top of the couloir. Photo by Eric Parsons.

I should mention
that this was the first climbing trip I had done with Eric in over a
year. In April 2016 Eric had done the Winter
Classic and tweaked his Achilles. His recovery had been a long
painful process, but given how he embraced the boot pack and took off you wouldn't
have known it. I watched him take off and then comfortably ascended 1500'
of solid shin-deep bootpacked snow to the summit ridge.

The South couloir
is a straight shot from the pocket glacier to the summit ridge. At times
the couloir steepens to around 50 degrees and is all of 20' wide. The top
has a short pitch of wild exposure as you traverse from the couloir proper to a
snow rib that takes you to the final rocky summit pyramid. I cached my
skis just before the final snow pitch and once on the ridge booted the final
100' of easy and exposed rock to the summit.

Final snow ridge to the summit. Photo by Eric Parsons.

We topped out on a perfect
winter day. Temps in the 20s, zero wind and not a cloud in any direction.
We sat around and looked in all directions recalling past days spent in the
mountains with friends and family.

Snapped this photo of Eric at the exact second that Nook stole a bite of his sandwich.

Looking across the Eagle Glacier at the icefall leading to Whiteout Glacier. If you look closely you can see ski tracks in the morain skiers left of the glacier.

Looking down at Raven Glacier and Crow Pass.

Eric & Nook heading down. I'm particularly fond of this photo because a few weeks after this trip Eric and I would head into the Eagle Glacier area and climb a number of peaks that can be seen in this photo.

And then down. A
careful downclimb of the ridge and exposed snow rib to a safe stance in the
couloir. Then skis and snowboard strapped on and down we went. I'd
like to say the run was perfect powder but it more like refrozen crust.
But aside from a couple steep pitches of mank that I sideslipped it skied well
enough and soon we were on the glacier and zipping back to Crow Pass where we skied breakable
sastrugi, ice, concrete and slide for life traverses all the way back to the
car.

Go time. Eric psyching himself up for the steep descent back to Raven Glacier.

Rook Mountain
Routes

Getting to the base of Rook Mountain is simple:
Go up and over Crow Pass and you'll be at the toe of Raven Glacier where you
must then decide which route to take. The mountain is rarely climbed and there
are almost as many routes as there are ascents. Of all the routes, I would say
the South Couloir appears to be the most straight forward - however it is also
the most conditions dependent route on the mountain (except for the North Glacier
of which little is known). If you want to do the South Couloir you'll
want to be completely confident in the snowpack since a minor point release in the couloir could easily be fatal. On the other hand,
the rock on the West and Southeast ridges is considerably fractured even by
Chugach standards so choose your poison: avalanches or loose rock.

Known Routes

Southeast Ridge
This was the first ascent route climbed by Dave Johnston, Vin
Hoeman, H. Van Der Lann, K Degenhardt, B Reed and G Hansen in August
1963. They (presumably) ascended Raven Headwall and then scrambled up the
ridge up and over point 6400' (the point west of Raven headwall) to
the summit. They descended to the Raven via the saddle between 6400'
and the summit. This was also the route climbed by Tom Choate and
Jeff Jablonski in June 1999.

Southeast Face
This was the second ascent
route by Willy Hersman and Greg Griffin in June 1986. According to the
Scree article they ascended a gully on the SE face, which I believe was on
the Eagle glacier side of Raven headwall.

West Ridge
This was first descended by Tom
Choate and Jeff Jablonski in June 1997 after they ascended via the SE ridge.
The ridge was ascended and descended by Wayne Todd and Steve Gruhn
in June 2003. Both Choate and Gruhn mentioned rotten rock numerous
times.

South Couloir
I believe this was first climbed by Kathy Still (partner unknown). The second
ascent was by Dave Hart, JT Lindholm and Ross Noffsinger in June
2009. Hart/Lindholm/Noffsinger descended via the saddle between the
summit and point 6400' which involved a spicy bergschund crossing.
The route is an obvious ski line but the first report of a ski descent I could
find wasn't until March 2017 by Mat Brunton and Sam Inouye.

Other routes

Northwest Face
This is the large cirque on the West face. This route would be best accessed via the bench
at the base of the West ridge. There is a steep snowy headwall with a
considerable bergschrund. The headwall would be a good 1500' ski mid/late
winter but I would suggest approaching it via the South couloir instead of
trying to boot up it.

North Glacier
This is a
beautiful glacier route that as far as I know has not seen an ascent.
From the Crow Pass trailhead to the summit is 11 miles (one way)
with 7500' of elevation gain. It would be a magnificent ski
mountaineering route. The three big unknowns are:
1. Gaining
treeline after leaving the Crow Pass trail at the Raven Gorge bridge. I
know it's steep and brushy. How steep and brushy are unknown.
2. Getting across the big
crevasse at 5500' that is clearly visible in all the photos and google imagery.
(Imagery from September 1996 shows a huge crevasse spanning the entire
glacier.)
3. Getting down. The ideal descent would be on skis down the ascent
route. However, it might be too cracked up at which point your options
would be to either down climb the Southeast ridge, or down climb the South couloir.

In short... a beautiful mountain with routes for everyone from choss loving ridge climbers to skiers looking for steep couloirs to mountaineers looking for a challenging spring glacier route. A good spring objective - Go for it!

Edit - June 4th, 2017: A few weeks after posting this Joe sent me an email asking for beta. Of course he wanted to ski the north glacier... and he went up there, booted up a gully on the south face and then skied the North glacier, skinned back to the top and skied the Northwest face. He said getting around the crevasse on the North glacier was fine. His photos looked awesome. Contact him if you have questions.